Save the animals, end trophy hunting!

Trophy hunting is highly controversial. Trophy hunting is nothing more than people killing animals for show; hunters kill and take the skin, horns/tusks, and preserved body. Trophy hunting has erupted into a billion-dollar industry. In some cases, villages keep the meat from the carcass because that’s all they have to live off of, but trophy hunters do not worry about that, they do it purely for show.

Healthy males are often the targets, as seen with Cecil the lion. Cecil was a Southern African lion that lived in the Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe. He was a major attraction for the park and was being studied and tracked by the University of Oxford for a study.

Cecil was wounded by an arrow from an American recreational big-game hunter. That hunter then tracked Cecil down and killed him with a rifle 40 hours after he was wounded by the arrow. Cecil was 13 years old when killed, and the guy who killed him had a permit and was not charged with any crime. The problem with that is killing the healthy males, removes the good genes from the population. The top 10 species imported as trophies include the big five African species which are lions, elephants, rhinos, buffalo, and leopards. These are also some of the most endangered animals. The hunting of these specific animals only further decreases the population of these animals, making them more endangered. With fear of extinction, the government should intervene with recreational hunting and trophy hunting to make a zero-tolerance law.

Trophy hunting must be carefully managed to preserve animal populations and avoid corruption. The world has a campaign against ivory trade. Elephants are brilliant and social animals, hunting them for only their tusks is cruel and not needed. When a herd of elephants loses just one elephant, it is like us losing a family member, elephants mourn their fallen loved ones. They remember the exact location the loved one is killed and mourns every time they pass the spot. This link, https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/08/elephants-mourning-video-animal-grief/ contains a video showing a herd mourning their dead.

Trophy hunting places the endangered species list at a higher risk for extinction. People pay hundreds of thousands for certain game animals and that money does not contribute to wildlife safety. The money needs to be recycled into the wildlife protection to re-establish protection and a stable population size for these animals.

Trophy hunters also poach. Poaching is the illegal hunting and/or capturing of wild animals. Usually poaching is associated with land-use rights, more and more land is being destroyed and animals are forced out of their habitats. Then those animals are hunted mercilessly. They are being forced into extinction without homes to go to and with the ruthless killing that’s happening to them.

Trophy hunting is an absolutely awful, unethical, torturous act that needs to be stopped now. Half of the animals that are hunted for their ivory/tusks/horns aren’t even killed, they just chop off the item they want and leave them to die a slow and terrible death. These trophy hunters must be stopped, or else these poor and innocent animals will become extinct for no reason other than a careless and selfless act done by people who just want to show off what they have done.

Below, are two links that show statistics of trophy hunting. Signing this petition will help increase the chance of an endangered animal’s life to be spared. This petition serves to end the hunting of endangered species for the sake of leisure and trophies. The import of any trophy, not just elephant trophies, will not be tolerated.